Talk:American Fundie Magazine

Hope

I hope that this page doesn't come off as too bitter. I started this page because these people need the piss taken out of them (not literally, that would be gross). I made the magazine cover first, and just had to follow it up with a page. Melikes, hopefully youlikes as well. Modusoperandi 05:32, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

From VFH

• Against. I am not saying that this article will never see the chance of getting featured, but how can I, as an anti-fundie proponent, possibly enjoy an article that protrays Ptolemaic Universe (which is an early Modern Catholic doctrine) as a 21st-century US Christian fundie idea? There are things that need not be there but are there anyway just for the sake of having more references (regardless of applicability). Yes, I know I am a bit harsh on this but I would rather vote for an article that is short but elegant and precise than one that is long but confusing and self-contradictory. -- The Colonel (talk) 09:15, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment I pruned a bit and swapped the (admittedly) ragged edge of geocentricism for the always popular creationism.--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 13:52, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment. Lots of this is inaccurate. It mixes up everyone from Christian Identity nuts (who hate the kikes because CIs are God's real Chosen People, and want Leviticus laws now and will rise in armed revolt to get them) to Grace Movement nuts (who think the hebes are none of their business, and don't care about Leviticus laws because they're irrelevant to the Grace Dispensation) to Pre-Millenial Dispensationalist nuts (who love their jewish allies in bringing about the End Times, and don't want Leviticus laws because the world has to fall apart before the Rapture can occur). And this is funny, because mixing them up will piss them all off. --Falcotron 00:53, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

    Comment I wouldn't say "mixed up"; it's more that all of the various fringe groups of the larger fringe group have been "mixed together" on the same page. I'd go mad if I had to make a page on each nut, individually. Mad!--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 02:04, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

    OK, mixed together. Either way, it's funny that way. Come to think of it, you could have a bit with reviews like this:

“While there is much to admire about this magazine, ultimately it is a foul AntiChrist-inspired heresy, a grave danger to children, promoting the heretical belief that [fill in the blank]”

~ [fill in the blank] Monthly

For example:

• ...not all Anabaptists go to Hell -- Southern Baptist Monthly
• ...not all Anabaptists and Baptists go to Hell -- Evangelical Methodist Monthly
• ...the exact date of the Rapture after the Tribulations cannot be found in the New Testament -- Post-Trib Pre-Millenial Dispensationalist Monthly
• ...the exact date of the Rapture before the Tribulations cannot be found in the Left Behind SeriesNew Testament -- The Left Behind SeriesPre-Trib Pre-Millenial Dispensationalist Monthly
• ...the exact date of the Rapture 3 years, 6 months, and 1.2 days into the Tribulations (assuming they start on a leap year) cannot be found in the New Testament -- Mid-Trib Pre-Millenial Dispensationalist Monthly
• ...the exact date of the Rapture in 79AD cannot be found in the New Testament, not to mention the history books -- Preterit Christian Monthly
• ...the Rapture can be found in the New Testament at all -- Non-Millenial Dispensationalist Monthly
• ...the Laws of the Old Testament apply to us today in the Grace Dispensation -- Traditional Dispensationalist Monthly
• ...the Laws of the Old Testament, the Gospels, and the first half of Acts apply to us today, in the Grace Dispensation -- Grace Movement Dispensationalist Monthly
• ...the Laws of the Old Testament, and the entire New Testament before Acts 28, apply to us today, in the Grace Dispensation -- Hyperdispensationalist Monthly
• ...the Jews, rather than the Anglo-Saxons, are the Nation of Israel -- British Israelite Monthly
• ...the Jews, rather than the Aryans, are the Nation of Israel -- Aryan Israelite Monthly
• ...the Jews, rather than the Anglo-Saxons and Aryans naturally born within the borders of the USA, are the Nation of Israel -- American Israelite Monthly
• ...the Jews should not be immediately exterminated -- Christian Identity Monthly
• ...Jesus was the Son of God -- Iranian Fundie Monthly

I could go on.... --Falcotron 04:26, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

You've put some thought into this. I doubt that a fundie mag would allow anything resembling criticism on its page. Witness any xtian site, the closest they come to criticism is the Apologetics section, and that's less criticism and more, "We hear you, but...". The verbal gymnastics that some go through to make Gen 1 & 2 not conflict (when the answer is the much simpler "One is from the Yahweh sect, the other Elohim) or them trying to justify butchers like Joshua (who killed pretty much everything that crossed his path) or Moses (particularly his genocide of Amalek). Moses, is typically presented as the "moral center" (Chuck was good in the Ten Commandments. Moses, not so much) which makes his jealousy that much worse (of course, one of the main points of the Bible is "Do what God wants, no matter how abhorent the task may be.", which should make apologia unnecessary). Of course, if it's just a quasi-historical mythological fable all of this is unnecessary. Wait, did I say "if"? Must've been a typo.

It's simpler to represent them as a unified block, both because it's what how they (sometimes) try to appear (ala "Christian Right"), and because the page risks losing focus otherwise (as there are just too many sects and subsects.). It's already a bit blurry (I've cut what I felt were the weaker bits, so now it's not so "listy"), there's probably more edits to come...I try to get out, but they keep pulling me back in.

As long as it gets people talking I've met my goal.

As for Iranian Fundies, there's a sliver of an idea floating around in my head, if it ever coalesces into a page I'll try to remember to give you a heads up. Currently it's just an idea for a 'shopped pic, but if it turns out anything like AFM (which started out as a pic too) it'll be a page eventually. I'm being held up by the fact that there are few pictures on the net, and what I need is fairly specific (otherwise I'll end up spending too much time on 'shopping to make it look right. It doesn't help that I keep trying to raise the bar...that I managed to get a pic featured just raises it higher...).--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 04:59, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

How would they not allow it? After all, Uncyclopedia is a fount of order and control. Sure, the fundies would just edit-war and vandalize each others' quotes... actually, that could be pretty funny....

But I get what you're saying. Any attempt to make a joke distinguishing among them would have to be longer than the rest of the page, and would get as tedious as... well, as they get in real life. Although it was funny when the Christian Coalition tried to write up a platform of their shared beliefs. Essentially the only thing they eventually agreed on was that "America should be a more Christian-friendly country." And even that compromise caused some churches and officers to leave. (Best of all, two of the officers who left went to work for the Democratic Leadership Council--you know, the Clinton/Gore/Lieberman axis of the Democratic Party, those Evil Liberals....)

I look forward to the Iranian Fundies Magazine. --User:Falcotron/sig 07:28, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

PS, it's hard for me to understand how anyone who comes up with the Dispensation framework can consider themselves fundamentalist--but the Preterists actually do a reasonable job taking the Bible literally. Jesus said He'd come back within the lives of some of his listeners? Well, then he must have; the Sack of Jerusalem was the Tribulations. Gen 1 and Gen 2 seem to contradict each other? No, He just created some things more than once. (Doesn't He create insects twice in Gen 2 anyway?) All of the laws of Deuteronomy are to be interpreted literally, so W must be stoned to death because he was recorded saying something disrespectful to his father during the Goldwater convention, and our soldiers should be killing every man, non-virginal woman, and meat animal in Iraq. And so on. They scare the hell out of me, but at least I understand them. Anyone between the CoE position (which is basically equivalent to yours) and the Preterit position baffles me. --User:Falcotron/sig 07:38, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't remember if insects pop up twice in Gen 2, but I'm pretty sure I remember something about God tells His chosen which four-legged insects are ok to eat. Must've been a quick speech. --Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 13:08, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Lev 11:21-22. Gotta love Leviticus for rules that are both inerrant and valid for todays modern desert-dwelling tribe.--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 13:59, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Wait, I think it's Gen 1. He creates the things that creepeth in day 5, and the creeping things that creepeth on the earth in day 6. He doesn't create insects at all in Gen 2. As for Leviticus, it's all great, but I especially love 12:8. One lamb = two turtles = two pigeons, no other substitutions allowed. --User:Falcotron/sig 16:38, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

There's a guy who's Blogging the Bible on Slate. It's interesting primarily in that he focuses on the human stories, and yada-yada-yada's most of the nasty shit. You'd figure a book by god would have advice like "Treat others as you would have them treat you." rather than rules on how badly you can beat your slaves. The NT is better...or at least it's less sexist/paranoid/racist...up to that last book, which is crap.--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 17:06, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the link; that looks pretty cool. I also found two different Christian sites that are doing the same exercize from a believers' point of view, which seems sort of pointless. Anyway, if that's what you expected, you don't know much about gods. Remember, Yahweh's first concern was that he be worshipped before all other gods. How did he win the argument with Job? By bragging that he created this whole mess and he has the power to do whatever he wants with it, so shut the hell up. That's a good way to prove your morality. But I'm guessing he's still much nicer than, say, the Akkadians' gods, whose first commandment was probably "Kill everyone," followed by, "Did you miss anyone? OK, good, now torture the survivors to death, burn the place down, salt the earth, and go find more people to kill somewhere." --User:Falcotron/sig 17:14, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I think the blogger is Judaist, or a least a liberal christian.

Before AFM I wrote Sack Religion, a page about the humble "cult" origins of religion. It wasn't entirely successful...I lost the spark when it got to the "what happens after the beginning?" bit. Still, I might go back and clean it up someday, if I ever figure out what it was that I was trying to say. That god is a good god, since it hasn't been around long enough to develop a power/profit structure. Meanwhile, in the real world, none of the above is better than the choices on offer. Abraham started a bad, bad thing.--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 17:25, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I read the intro; I think he's a follower of Very-Reform Judaism, which was I believe the official religion where I grew up in the San Fernando Valley. The Moral and Ritual Ten Commandments are reworded into something like, "Be good to your neighbors, and know how to wear a yarmulke for funerals, and God'll pretty much let everything else slide." Not a bad religion, as far as the Judeo-Christian-Islamic spectrum goes.

As for Abraham, I don't think things were much better before him. I suspect human sacrifice isn't any more fun with multiple gods than with a single one.

With Sack Religion, yeah, it's not all that consistent, but there's some funny stuff and some good satire (even if Pterry and the Pythons and the FSM guy have done most of it first); I think it's worth revisiting. --User:Falcotron/sig 19:45, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

As for before Abraham, I suspect that most, if not all of the phallic cults were (and are) bad. The female god cults, I don't know...even those pesky atheists have their share of being shitty to people (unlike the Christians, however, they can't whitewash over their crimes by saying, "They weren't true atheists:™".

I suspect that I've moved on from the adorable naivety of Sack Religion.--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 20:04, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

The "Goddess cults" are mostly a fantasy made up from whole cloth by guys in the 20th century who wanted to create new religions that would get them laid. Look up the history of Wicca, and the OTO and Golden Dawn that he cribbed from. That new age crap bothers me almost as much as the Christian crap. Every pre-Christian society that we have any evidence for had a whole slew of gods, and always with a male on top. Sure, a few Greek and Celtic cities had a goddess for their local honcho--but they didn't act noticeably different for it (and remember, Zeus was still Athena's father and master). There was no "golden age" before the phallocentric patriarchy ruined everything; there was only a worse phallocentric patriarchy that was overthrown by one not quite as bad (as with Zeus and his dad). Even when they had female leaders briefly, because all of the male members of the family had already died in some bloody war, the females fought the same wars--which isn't surprising, if you think of QEI or Margaret Thatcher. Primitive people were just like civilized people, but worse: the Celts decorated in human skulls, the Plains Indians drove herds of buffalo off cliffs just so they could skim off the top, and the Aztecs sacrificed more people before 9am than most religions do all week. As for atheists, people like Stalin treated Communism as if it were a religion, with its own sacred rites and inquisitionable heresies, so it's no surprise they weren't any better. Kim's Cult of Juche is not exactly more rational than Torquemada's Cult of the Nazarene.... --User:Falcotron/sig 22:23, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

As long as if there is a god it turns out to be someone like Dionysus, I'll be happy. Or drunk. Which is kind of the same thing, really. Idealisms of all kinds are dangerous when put to use, as they (Communism, Theocracy, etc) attempt to force the real world to be something it's not (that being the ideal). Too bad about peoples inability to consistently meet in the middle.

Weird how a three line critique of a satirical page on a wiki that prides itself on its inaccuracy could generate a conversation this long...the picture for Image:Leftbehind.jpg and the page Left Behind did the same thing...must be something about religion (and its misuse), I guess.--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 22:45, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, AFM and Left Behind are both funny and clever articles, but the sad fact is that the fundies/vangies are much funnier than us. Especially the Pre-Tribulationist Pre-Millenial (non-Grace) Dispensationalist Evangelical Non-Denominationals like LaHaye. I mean, even the label--how can you really do it justice with a parody?

P.S., when you imagine how pissed off LaHaye would be if the Rapture came before he had time to finish the last book in his series, don't you almost want him to be right? --User:Falcotron/sig 02:39, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I picture Jesus coming back, reading his father's book and saying, "No, no, no! That's not what we said at all! Are you fucking retarded? You got the bit right where Pop said he'd take the first 144,000 male jewish virgins but, fuck, the rest of this is all wrong!". Or words to that effect.

P.S. I put on my userpage that AFM "Landed on VFH to a smattering of tepid applause". <Sigh> . There were other pages of mine I'd have nom'd, but this is my favourite (as it takes a serious, ne terrifying, subject and strips away the bullshit, leaving a funny/scary candy centre). Plus this was genuinely hard to write. Both of my Poo Lit entries (comedies) just kind of appeared fully formed; less the weeks of tweaking). Still, at least there were six people that got AFM. If this is anything like my VFP experience was, it'll take four or five noms getting soundly thrashed before I strike comedy gold. "Againsts" and "I don't get its" I can stand, it's the lack of anything since 28 Aug that bugs me. Of course I feel better when I look at the pic and read the "How White was Jesus?" headline; that's the line that started this whole thing. Not that my shit is deep; it's just a subject that makes me mad, and writing a page about it made me feel better.--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 03:12, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

It seems like a lot of good articles linger for a while at about 5 for/0 against and then get taken off and quasied. It's sad. --User:Falcotron/sig 03:32, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I think it's because it's the end of summer and the traffic is down because people are getting ready to go back to school. Coincedently I just made a forum about my theory. It is sad, though. Pages like Euripides have been there forever.--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 03:39, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Where's Sinner

I lolled at this. I thought for sure it would've been the naked clown. John1728 22:23, 31 August 2006 (UTC) John S.

Aww, I was hoping for a ROFL, at least.--Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 23:00, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

How about LMAO? Though I would have thought the man hanging round the porta-loo was it. ~Orian57~ ~Talk~ 18:30 30 March 2009

Well, Satan is obviously messing with you. He does shit like that all the time. Sir Modusoperandi ^Boinc! 19:12, 30 March 2009 (UTC)